New sevens app is a winner

Keeping up with the play at the TECT National Sevens to be held at Tauranga Domain this weekend will be a breeze thanks to an innovative app designed by Toi Ohomai Institute of Technology students.

The joint initiative with Bay of Plenty Rugby has produced an easy to use mobile phone app that enables supporters to follow the progress of their teams with instant updates.

The app will keep track of the scores from pool games and elimination rounds during the tournament that runs over Saturday and Sunday. There is also information about team lists and past winners.

The free progressive web app is a new technology used to load websites fast on mobile devices. Once the app has been saved to a device it can show content even without an internet connection.

It was a testing challenge for the students involved on many levels, not least the geographical split.

Level 7 computer science students Corban Hirawani, Peter Bowman and Kimberley Mackay are based at the Rotorua Campus, with Jackson Currie and senior tutor and project leader, Jeffrey Kranenburg, based at the Tauranga campus.

“Part of our third year, Level 7 programme is a 45-point project. The students can choose what they want they want to do but because this was a real life client and they didn’t have to make one up, we suggested it would be really good for their CV and a massive experience to work on this,” Jeffrey says.

“That is how it came about. They have been working on the project for the last semester over three to four months. They have been able to go right from the point of conception right through to a finished product.”

The project is hopefully the start of an on-going relationship with the TECT National Sevens tournament in place for the next three years in Tauranga.

“The next group of students that come through would take this as a basis and improve upon it with new features and that sort of thing,” Jeffrey says.

“It is a very exciting prospect for them.”

Bay of Plenty Rugby’s Strategic Partnerships and Special Projects Manager, David Pearce, is delighted with the project’s success.

“It is a neat step forward. We are excited about it. We have enjoyed working with those students. They are used to working with theory and now they have been able to link with industry with something that is really tangible,” David says.

“To produce an app for a New Zealand Rugby tournament is a pretty awesome thing for the students. It is going to add to the tournament.

“We are about running innovative tournaments, using technology and we think this is another neat addition that our spectators at the ground, or following around the country or the world, can utilise and have real time feedback on results.